President Trump asked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to step aside after months of disagreement, and has replaced him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo.
President Trump spoke March 13, after it was announced he ousted Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and planned to tap CIA Director Mike Pompeo to replace him.
The shake-up left officials at the State Department and throughout the national security community flummoxed, and the circumstances of the firing were in dispute.
Trump had told his chief of staff he wanted to announce he was replacing Tillerson on Twitter.
Trump also had words of praise for Tillerson despite their well-documented rifts: “Finally, I want to thank Rex Tillerson for his service.
For months, he has been saying Russia clearly meddled in the 2016 U.S. election, even as Trump shied away from any critical remarks.
Where Trump proclaimed on Aug. 21 that “our troops will fight to win,” Tillerson laid out a much more modest agenda. »